Faith and Beggorah, Sodom and Gomorrah

To this point gays have not been
allowed to march in the Saint 
Patrick's DayParade in New York. 
Then please  Explain this.

The world is coming to an end.  The New York Saint Patrick’s Day Parade Committee is permitting one gay organization—a gay employee association of NBC which broadcasts the parade—to march in the annual Saint Patrick’s Day Parade up 5^th Avenue under a banner identifying themselves as gay.  And to see how the katholic krazies’ blogosphere lit up like an IRA molotov cocktail y’ad think it was Sodom and Gomorrah right thereon 5^th Avenue.  And of course, it is all Cardinal Dolan’s doing.  You know, Gay-Friendly Cardinal Dolan.  You remember Cardinal Dolan.  He’s the guy in the red dress who called upon Catholics to "be a witness for the truth of marriage in word and action" and confirmed that the Bishop’s Conference wanted the Supreme Court to uphold both DOMA and Proposition 8. He is the fellow who ardently reminded the New York Catholic faithful that “true Christians” should oppose marriage equality for the LGBT community.  He is the fellow that took on Governor Andrew Cuomo over the issue of same sex marriage.  And now he is refusing to turn his back on the Gay community of New York.

The real villain in the story is, of course,  Cardinal Dolan’s mother who taught him to be a gentleman and have good manners.  Thanks to mom and her etiquette he doesn’t spit in people’s faces.  This is a huge disappointment to the wing-nuts who would like to see gays thrown out the front doors and down the steps of Saint Patrick’s Cathedral and then burned at the stake for the evil perverts they are.  The fact that the Cardinal is civil to all he meets whether it is President Obama or gays is just more than the scribes and Pharisees can deal with.  “Get rid of the parade and the Al Smith dinner” they cry with hoarse but impassioned voices.

The Saint Patrick’s Day Parade is not a religious event.  The first Saint Patrick’s Day parades in the United States were organized by Irish Protestants and were not meant as an expression of religious piety but as a celebration of Irish nationality.  The New York Parade, the largest and most famous in the world, was never from the first parade of Irish Soldiers serving the Crown just before the American Revolution to the present day, a religious procession and, despite passing by the steps of the Cathedral where it is traditionally greeted by the Archbishop of New York, has never had the character of anything other than a civic parade.  So what is the problem? 

The Church says there is no sin, indeed nothing morally wrong, in homosexuality but only in the sexual act between two people of the same sex. (Lest the LGBT community feel singled out, the Church says the same about any sexual act between two people, a man being one and a woman being the other, who are not properly married to each other.)  I am presuming that the parade will not include people having sex with one another if, for no other reason, it’s being televised would break FCC rules.  Should we pretend there are no gay Irish?  Should we pretend that gay people do not exist?  I am sorry, but the Gay community is here to stay and we had might as well make them feel at home—they include your brother, your cousin, your aunt, your nephew, the girl you dated in high-school, the teacher you had a crush on in sophomore year, and quite possibly you yourself, perhaps aware of it; perhaps not.  So whether it is marching next to you next Saint Patrick’s Day or kneeling next to you at Mass next Sunday, or sitting next to you at the Raven’s game, or standing next to you at the metro stop, get used to having Gay People around.  They aren’t going to go away.  And if your mother is half the mother that Cardinal Dolan’s was, you will show good manners.